| Nā wai koe? From whose waters do you descend? |
| Tēnā koutou katoa Kei ēnei whārangi taku whakapapa Ko Kōtirana, ko Ingarangi tōku tūrangawaewae Ko Waiouru rāua ko Papakura ngā wāhi i tipu ake au Ko Tāmaki Makaurau - Auckland tōku kāinga Ko Maungakiekie - One Tree Hill tōku maunga Ko Manukau tōku whanga Ko Russell William Fergusson Carter ahau Ko William nō taku pāpā, ko Fergusson nō taku koroua me tōna pāpā Tēnā tātou katoa. |
| In 1983, I was a young man working as a cook at Morisset Hospital, a psychiatric facility on Lake Macquarie in NSW, Australia. While living in the nurses' accommodation I met a nurse researching his Australian convict ancestors. Knowing next to nothing about my own family history, I was inspired to embark on the journey myself. Back then, computers were just beginning to emerge, rudimentary and without internet. Communication was via letters, and research meant physically visiting archives, purchasing records, and reading. It was a slow process, but receiving letters from helpful people at historical societies in places like Norfolk Island was satisfying. Each question unearthed a deeper story. |
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Today I am only an eddy in the flow of things: But to-morrow I shall be a river. New Zealand poet Ursula Bethell |
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Behind this website of over 180 HTML pages lies a database containing 30,636 people [as of October 2024]. These entries are not just names and dates, but fascinating stories of individuals who loved, lived, and navigated life’s challenges. I have endeavoured to be thorough and accurate—like a proper genealogist. However, I acknowledge that, as one delves further back in time, and without the certainty of DNA, inaccuracies may have crept in—both in my work and in the records I’ve accessed. It will be up to future generations (or AI, perhaps) to fact-check my work, fill in the gaps, and add stories I have not gathered. This website is a record of the places I’ve travelled, and the people I’ve met in my mind and imagination. I am grateful for their stories.
The homepage background photo is of the Strong girls, late 1930s, at Plimmerton Beach. Mana Island is in the background. The man running on the beach with them was a family friend called Uncle Fred, who was married to Aunty Peg. They came over—together with Robert and Eva Strong—from England in 1924, on the ship Remuera. The youngest girl is my mother, Doreen Carter. Hilda, the girl in the middle, turned 100 on 2 April 2025. Sisters Gladys and Muriel are not far behind. Included is a website that I wrote for a friend, Chris Brown, who I served in the NZ Army with when we were young: Brown Family and two BMW interest websites (now archived): BMW Airheads NZ and BMW Airheads Australia |
| Russell William Fergusson Carter Auckland, New Zealand |
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